The Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is now defenitely the happiest person in the world who, amidst the tons of problems and political debris of war in Gaza where the Israeli army has not been able to achieve much after 10 months of extensive operations, can breathe comfortably though for some time as he is struggling under heavy pressure of critics.
However, just against Netanyahu’s imagination, a look at this atmosphere reveals that the assassination instead of impacting the war developments on the ground in favor of the Israelis will only escalate tensions, push the region to the war, and take the deterrence equations of Iran-led Axis of Resistance out of their nature of predictability.
Actually, now the important question is not how the Israelis managed to assassinate Haniyeh but how the Iran-led alliance will deal its blow to make the Israelis regret their crime and what change this response will cause to the equation of deterrence and the regional situation that is drifting to war.
There is no doubt that assassination of the leader of Hamas in Iran is part of the propaganda policy of the Israelis in the current stage of the war to propagate that the conflict has extended to the borders of the Islamic Republic. In order to target Haniyeh, the Israelis had months to assassinate him in Qatar or Turkey, and therefore assassination was not the only goal of the Israelis, and this action was intended to be specifically carried out on Iranian soil.
Aware of certainty of Iranian response as Tehran did in April under Operation True Promise and also certainty of the realization of threat of Hezbollah chief Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah who unveiled Tel Aviv-for-Beirut equation, Netanyahu put on his agenda suicidal measures as vulnerability of the occupied territories against the retaliatory approach of the Resistance camp is totally proven to him. In fact, in a situation where the exhausted Israeli army is completely grounded and frustrated against the resistance groups in Gaza and the internal support for the war amid the growing gap in the occupied territories is at its lowest level in the past 10 months, subjecting a threatable and near-disarmed Israel to an assault of a united and powerful alliance can only be compared to a suicide.
Or possibly, Netanyahu and his advisors predict the Axis of Resistance's response, especially Iran's, within the limits of the past deterrence equations. But this optimism simply ignores this question as why the Islamic Republic and the Axis of Resistance in general, which have gained further self-confidence to directly strike the occupied territories and are at their offensive formation after Operations Al-Quds Storm and True Promise, should fear expansion of scope of war. This is not a question the Israelis can simply ignore. So, it should be seen what conditions have emerged that Netanyahu and his orbit find it a must to unlock this stage despite their awareness of the inevitable dangers of such suicidal actions.
Indeed, part of answer to this question has to do with Netanyahu’s struggle to save his political place and escape collapse of his hardline coalition cabinet. Now the pressures inside the occupied territories, especially from the army commanders and security apparatus, are very intense on Netanyahu's cabinet to stop the war and strike a prisoner swap deal. Meanwhile, aware of him being recognized as the man responsible for Gaza war defeat and and the opposition pressure for a probe to determine those responsible for October 7 attack, and the subsequent certain call for early elections, Netanyahu is bending over the backwards to foil the negotiations for ceasefire.
But this is not the only aspect of the story. Rather, there is a more important behind-the-scenes reality: The reality is that Israel has reached its full capacity to accommodate and tolerate the home and foreign crises and the Israeli leaders are aware of the certain reality that the traditional equations of deterrence against the Palestinian resistance groups have totally collapsed and the 10-month Gaza war has failed to re-formulate these equations in favor of the Israelis and West Bank is on its way to becoming another Gaza in terms of defiance and resistance to the occupation. At the same time, abroad, Resistance camp has become the main element and heaviest variable determining the transitioning regional security structure, and this means that the future security balance will accelerate the environmental threats against the Israeli existence in a domino way. In fact, if previously the Israelis were able to deplete part of the military power of the Palestinian groups with quick and destructive wars against Gaza, or in other words, to mow down the growing threats, in the new situation this comfort does not exist for the Israelis and any hawkish action against Gaza and the West Bank will draw unified response of the Resistance camp on several fronts.
This means that Israel, which remains at the level of existential security, has already failed to advance its newest defense-security strategy it approved in 2015 under Defense Force Strategy which rests on such principles as being offensive, taking advantage of regional gaps, maintaining intelligence dominance, and building cyber hegemony.
This failure, for its part, applies to political, economic, and social aspects of the Israeli society because in Israel security concerns overshadow other aspects of policy-making, and protecting military security is not only the general top priority , but also is the top priority of the political, economic, scientific, and research sectors.
That is why when we look at the remarks of the Israeli officials and observers after Operation Al-Aqsa Storm, they openly talk about the clouds of danger of collapse overshadowing Israel. In June, Israeli analyst Ben Cospit told Maariv that 9 months after Hamas attack which he described as "catastrophe", one of the main issues in front of them is possibility of collapse of Israel.
In such a situation, we can better understand why Netanyahu
and his cabal resort to the gamble of suicidal actions to cut off the
chain of present trends through creating regional chaos. But covering up
the happening realities have so far failed to fully conceal the reality
of Israeli leaders' struggle to escape the abyss and distance the
apocalyptic ghost of collapse over Israel.
/129